Re: California
Posted on May 15, 2009 Posted by John Scalzi 45 Comments
As I’ve had more than one person forward me a “Prop 8 Overturned!” link from the LA Times:
Folks, the story I’m getting sent to me is from May 16, 2008. Which is, you know, a year ago. I’m seeing no current news about the case regarding Prop 8 that’s now at the California Supreme Court. And while I would be personally delighted to see Prop 8 overturned, as far as I know it hasn’t been.
What we’ve learned today: Check dates on news stories before forwarding them on. Thanks.
This just in: Lincoln Assassinated!
You know my great-great uncle did that deed. The dumbass.
(disbelieve roll)
(comes up with 1’s)
(looks up)
Really?
What I’ve heard is that apparently the LATimes sent it through as a tweet accidentally this morning, which is why it’s suddenly making the rounds.
GregLondon:
Really.
Shit. Sort of takes the funny out of #1. Hm.
This just in: Washington Elected President!
Apparently someone tweeted that link, and it got posted on Making Light, and I read it and thought you’d want to know. So I’m a bozo. Sorry.
*shoots that particular Twit in the head* Sic semper dorkazoidis!
I’d feel worse about spreading this erroneous news via twitter myself if it hadn’t started with a tweet from the freaking LA Times itself (http://twitter.com/latimes). I hope someone over there is getting spanked.
A friend of mine got caught by that, sent me the link, and then realized the date was wrong.
Tim Pratt @ 7: Tried that link and am being told it does not exist…
John H @ 9 – try here:
http://twitter.com/latimes
When I clicked it, it accidentally included the end parenthesis -“)”. If you go there manually, it’s there – and their latest tweet is : “Here is the latest @latimes story on California’s Prop 8 (May 4, 2009) “Same-sex marriages gradually gain legal ground” http://bit.ly/HUhrn ”
FWIW.
-Rob
But, the decision is expected before June 1 when the CA Supreme Court ends its term. I think I heard that they only issue opinions on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so 4 possible days left.
Certainly. However, it is not here yet.
I have a pirate in my family tree. Which is weird, because I generally side with the ninjas.
Tim Pratt @ 7 I hope someone over there is getting spanked.
Hey. Whoa. Under Prop 8 spanking = 1 man, 1 woman, and 1 pair of fuzzy handcuffs, like it says in the bible.
The bible is remarkably silent on the subject of sex toys, as well.
You never can tell about relatives can you. I’m distantly related to General George Armstrong Custer. On the same side of the family that includes Cree and Sans Arc Sioux Native American tribes. Go figure.
On topic: Prop 8 will go down, just a matter of time…
Well one good thing about this. I hit up http://www.latimes.com to just check it out and found out something good.
Zombies!
Run!
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-zombieants16-2009may16,0,4869367.story
Yeah, a number of posts on my friends list at Facebook go:
“YAY! CALIFORNIA ISN’T DUMB ANYMORE!”
Followed a few minutes later with:
“California still dumb and so am I apparently…”
Thankfully, I’m not one of those said people as the year appears in the URL for the LA Times story.
MasterThief:
I have fond memories of drinking pirate grog (Barq’s — in a bottle, dammit) at a place called Barataria Tavern about thirty, no, forty, years ago. Looks like it’s been swallowed up by greater NOLA, now. This is supposed to have been Lafitte’s stomping grounds back in the day.
There was a sign by a nearby waterway that said “Goose Bayou.” We kids then repeatedly pointed at each other and said, “Hey! There’s a Goose Bayou!” Good times…
Yeah, I got that, too. But it was from @latimes and then not 20 minutes later, they retracted and apologized for the goof. So all in all it was an amusing fail.
JS, that also means that you are related to one of the great Shakespearean actors yet known,. According to Lawrenzo the Great (sorry on the spelling) one of two.
LA Times spread it (they claim accidentally) but didn’t start it.
http://daggle.com/how-prop-8-rumor-on-twitter-started-639
I’m cousin to Charles Julius Guiteau. (Garfield’s Assassin.)
Patrick Swayze, William Holden, Carrie Fisher, John Kerry, Patrick Buchanan, and Mitt Romney are also cousins. (of each other, CJ Guiteau, and me.)
http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/users/g/o/d/Bryan-S-Godfrey/FILE/0196page.html
My best friend’s sister’s boyfriend’s brother’s girlfriend heard from this guy who knows this kid who’s going with a girl who saw an LA Times tweet that Prop 8 was overturned. I guess it’s pretty serious.
Regarding #12:
(a) The California Supreme Court’s website says:
For the convenience of the public, litigants, and the press, Supreme Court decisions are normally filed at two set times each week—Mondays and Thursdays at 10 a.m. At that time, decisions are made available to the public in the clerk’s office and on the California Courts Web site (www.courtinfo.ca.gov/courts/supreme).
An exception is made for Memorial Day week, when decisions are filed on Tuesdays.
(b) the “end of session” in June is just the end of oral arguments; the same document says “The Supreme Court hears oral arguments during one week of each month, from September through June, in its courtrooms in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Sacramento (and occasionally at additional locations). Throughout the year, the court remains open and engaged in its other work, which includes researching and drafting calendar memoranda and opinions and conducting weekly case conferences.”
(c) court policy, from the same document, requires the opinion to be filed within 90 days of the oral argument (which is June 3 if ‘day’ includes Sundays and June 10 if not).
Confused… if prop 8 was voted on in the 11/08 election, then why would a 5/08 article announce its overturn?
Sarah, it wouldn’t. But some Twitter twit* announced it as new yesterday, and some of us who were desperately waiting for good news out of CA didn’t look carefully enough and started spreading it.
The CASC overturned an anti-marriage-equality law a year ago. That’s what led to the Brief Shining Moment that was halted by the moronic majority of the CA electorate in Prop 8.
It was a dumb mistake made yesterday by a lot of overenthusiastic people, including me. And possibly a malicious practical joke by the aforementioned twit, but no one knows that for sure.
___
*Don’t you think ‘twit’ should be the name for Twitter users?
Xopher:
Yes! Twit should be the name for Twitter users. So very appropriate!
It was my understanding that Proposition 8 was an amendment to California’s constitution, and that trumped anything that California’s Supreme Court might say, do, or want.
@27: I call stupid tweets/tweeters “twits” and a-hole tweets/tweeters “twats.” Works well.
Also, I’ve been told I’m descended from Benedict Arnold. Haven’t been able to confirm it yet, though we have confirmed that we had ancestors on the Mayflower. Weird.
Somehow this is simply appropriate for this type of discussion: http://www.televisiontunes.com/Benny_Hill_Show.html
Help me understand a bit about this issue. Can same sex folks form a civil union under CA law? Isn’t marriage a religious ceremony (e.g. a sacrament in the Catholic faith) and even after an opposite sex couple get married, they still have to file for a civil union under the State?
Why can’t we come up with another term for same sex unions, and not impact those of religious persuasion so heavily?
Maybe I’m wrong about the civil unions.
David… you have asked for it.
Thanks, JJ.
Somehow I think there’s a win win, living in the SF area and knowing so many on both sides. I really don’t know where the right answer is.
@31: I believe what one files for is generally called a marriage license. The words are just words, but they get all politicized. There has NEVER been any real basis (as far as I can tell) for the complaint that this issue will force churches to do anything (Catholic churches aren’t forced to marry divorced people, for example). It’s more that people don’t think that through so it’s the best argument a lot of the opponents have without just outright saying that they don’t like gay people.
@31: I was trying to find which country does this but my google-fu is weak this morning. In any case, I remember reading that some country (in Europe probably), did officially make a distinction between marriage as religious and civil union as legal. As it turned out, a lot of straight people just went for the civil union option too. The thing is though, you are still in the position that if you make a law against religious marriage for homosexuals, you’re STILL tromping all over the rights of all those religions that would be perfectly happy to marry homosexuals. I think the best option is what the states are doing where they write into the law confirmation that religions aren’t going to be forced to do anything.
@34; very good point, maybe a big push back is that some feel it will force a given church or faith to allow/grant a certain type of marriage within the church. This of course is not the case, you cannot and should not be able to force a church to perform a ceromony they do not agree with. I am sure it would be more than catholics, mormons, baptists, etc that would not want to have gay marriage within the church but also muslims, jews and others.
Dave Payne: No, because separate is never equal, and the fight is for equality. This has been discussed to death on this site. JimmyJones was on the opposite side from me on it and that’s what he’s referring to. Look at earlier posts (such as “Five”) and you’ll see all the arguments. Go, read, decide for yourself.
Oh, I partially misread you, Dave. The ONLY thing at issue here is whether same-sex couples should be able to get the standard state marriage license, and after solemnization and signatures as required, enjoy all the benefits and be subject to the same responsibilities as opposite-sex couples.
I’m related to that fine, stalwart and upstanding U.S. President — Warren G. Harding. Keeping graft in government the old fashioned way — in the White House poker game!
Dr. Phil
@39: fine, stalwart and upstanding
Last I checked, he was supine. :-)
Johnny, at 28: one of the issues is whether or not Proposition 8’s proponents followed the proper procedure when they qualified it for the ballot; the Constitution provides two different procedures, one for amendments and one for revisions. If the wrong procedure was followed, then the vote is not binding.
Jeff S. (#17)
And my paternal grandmother (then Flora Stacey) dated (*) one of G. A. Custer’s younger brothers.
She also sometimes liked to mention that she was the only child in her family with black hair & eyes, a Roman nose, and an olive complexion, that all her siblings were blond & blue-eyed, and that she was born a bit more than a year after they’d moved to a small community (near Jackson, Michigan) where all the other inhabitants were Indians.
(* As in “he escorted her to several Church Socials”.)
One more time: churches do not have to extend religious ceremonies in violation of the tenets of their faith. This was true before same-sex marriage and continues to be true. The only people who claim otherwise are a) ignorant or b) manipulative, lying sacks of shit pushing scary propaganda.
“Can same sex folks form a civil union under CA law? Isn’t marriage a religious ceremony (e.g. a sacrament in the Catholic faith) and even after an opposite sex couple get married, they still have to file for a civil union under the State?”
The problem with the whole “civil union for a civil marriage-like thing that gays can have, and reserve ‘marriage’ as a term for religious ceremonial unions” argument is that it doesn’t really take into account religions with no problem performing same-sex marriages (as a couple of people here have sort of mentioned).
If you want marriage=the domain of religion, then to not allow same sex marriages solemnized by Unitarian churches, Episcopal Curches With A Super-Liberal Local Bishop, liberal Reform Synagogues and so on and so on to be called “marriage” then that’s just hypocrisy, and an instance of some religions dictating what other religions can do, plain and simple.